Fashionably early

23rd March 2012: Taking centre stage at the FNAC on Avenue des Ternes

The Lives of others

On 23rd March 2012, I met the band Other Lives. They had been touring with Radiohead, and had organised a free show at a bookstore in the 17th arrondissement. The opportunity to see them live was too good to pass up; so after my morning English lecture at the Sorbonne, where I did a fifteen minute oral presentation on The Onion, I made my way to FNAC at Avenue des Ternes. I had forgotten to bring my stationery to university that Friday, so I had asked the student with whom I did the oral presentation if I could borrow her pen so that I could potentially collect autographs from the band. ” But are they famous?” she said raising her eyebrows suspiciously.

“Oui”, I replied.

“Ok then!” she said. She gave me the pen, and off I went.

The problem, however, was that I didn’t know where the bookstore was, and so I had to ask for directions. Even then, the first person I came across did not seem in any mood to help me.

“Excusez-moi, monsieur…” I began.

“Non, non, non,” he said, shaking his head, his eyes wide in shock horror. He was acting Parisian, probably thinking I was begging him for money. I didn’t judge him for that, however. Daily metro rides in the company of actual beggars does wear you down after a while. But I still wanted help, so I asked him where the bookstore was.

“Est-ce que vous savez où se trouve le FNAC?” I asked him. He then stopped. He obviously figured I didn’t pose him a threat.

“Ah, mais c’est juste là,” he said, pointing me in the direction of the avenue where the bookstore was to be found.

I walked towards the store and then entered it. The FNAC was like Borders, but with televisions and digital cameras on sale on the ground floor. I then took the escalators up to the top storey, where the children’s books section was located. At the back of the room, there was a stage which had a microphone and a piano. Next to the stage were five or six rows of seats and a stand showcasing their new album. This was obviously where the show was to take place. A man then arrived onto the stage and began testing the mic. When I asked him if I could walk on the stage, he said he couldn’t see why I couldn’t; so I went up on it and took photos.

About an hour later, the band emerged from a side door. They began practising some songs, parts of which I filmed while standing next to boxes of Playmobil and colouring-in pencils. People soon began arriving at the venue, forming a queue behind me. I began filming them while I was waiting patiently at the front of the line where the audience had to queue up before they could gain access to the seating area. At one point I could see the members looking right into my camera. Then as Jon, the violinist, began walking back toward the door from where he had entered the room, I took a photo of him. “Hey” I said.

“Bonjour” he replied. I had forgotten he would’ve thought I was French.

“I speak English.”

“Oh…nice!” he replied. He went past the door and the other members soon followed him.

Then they all came out again and we were all allowed access to the seats. Until then, there had been uncertainty as to whether the queue actually meant anything: some people simply went to sit down on the seats, ignoring the signs telling people to line up. It didn’t matter in the end because they were then expelled from the seats. When the permission to get to the seats was then given, there was a great scramble for the few which were available. Of all the things in the world, one thing is certain: free concert + free seats = chaos. When something becomes freely accessible to everyone, you feel like you’ve been cheated if you can’t benefit from it, which is evidence that adults have never left their naughty inner-child completely behind.

What I found interesting about the audience was how diverse they were. Normally in New Zealand, most people at such a concert would be hipsters, but there weren’t any of them in sight. There was a girl to my left called Amélie, with whom I exchanged contact details. There was also an older woman sitting in a seat in front of me. She was actually blocking my view somewhat, making it impossible for me to film the stage, so I asked the man sitting on the side of the aisle if we could swap seats. We swapped seats, and moments later, the show began with the band playing Old Statue. I started to film them at this point, and managed to capture the first fifteen minutes of the show until my camera’s memory card maxed out.

At the end of the show, people were queuing up to talk to the band. People were buying discounted Other Lives albums to get autographed. I got in line but I didn’t have any albums on me, so I pulled out my Sorbonne American Media textbook. When I met Jon properly this time, I told him that I knew it was weird to sign a textbook, but I asked him if he could do it anyway. He did and then passed it along to the other members. A lot of people wanted to have photos taken with the band, and so they kept asking me to hold their cameras. I took their photos and then got to meet Jesse. He turned out to be the coolest guy I’d ever met and seemed completely at ease mingling with everyone. I got a picture taken with him and Josh Onsett, the bassist and asked them to come to New Zealand. They said that New Zealand was really beautiful, but that weren’t going there this year; however they were to play in Australia later this year. I then saw Jenny putting her cello into its case and I asked her if I could get her autograph. She turned out to be a lot shyer than Jesse, but all the members were incredibly down to earth and friendly. I asked her how the Radiohead tour was going, and she said it was amazing. “They’re our idols as well and so it feels like we’re living the dream at the moment.” I asked her what Thom Yorke was like and she said he was really nice, but when I asked her about Jonny Greenwood, she said she didn’t get to meet him because “he tends to stick to himself.” I then asked them to wish Radiohead luck on my behalf, and she said would. I was then going to talk to Colby Owens, the drummer, who was standing around by himself looking a little sheepish, but at that moment I found myself talking to Josh again. He said the band would be back in July, but I said I would probably be unable to make that show. I also said that unfortunately, I wouldn’t be able to make the concert later that evening because the tickets sold out extremely fast.

What happened next was unexpected. He then talked to Jesse, who then asked one of the staff members to get my down my name on her iPhone. Jesse said he was really pleased to have met me and that I had been really useful, and so as a reward, the band were inviting me to the concert as a special guest that night! The staff member told me to make my way to Café de la Danse near Bastille before 8pm and give the employees there my name, and that they would let me into the concert.

After the showcase, I went to the lower floor of the FNAC to buy a new memory card. I then took the metro to Line 1 and got off at Bastille. It was a really trendy looking area with lots of full bars. I got inside Café de la Danse and made my way up the stairs. There was a balcony looking down onto the support act playing that night. After perhaps twenty minutes, I saw Jesse appear. He had come up the stairs and was now proceeding down the staircase reserved to the band members. “Jesse!” I said.

“Oh hey man, thank you so much for coming.”

“Thank you for inviting me,” I said. I found it strange how he was the one with all the effusive praise when I was the one benefiting from his act of kindness. “Good luck for tonight,” I said.

The show began with As I Lay My Head Down and was characterised with intense lighting effects. The songs were also identical to how they sounded on the album. It was easily the greatest concert I had ever seen. It was made all the sweeter in that I saw a €35 exclusive show for free. After the show had ended, I went to the lower floor where some of the band members were mingling with their fans. Jesse was drinking red wine from two glasses (“this is what I call double-dunking”). I shook his hand for the third time that day and asked if he could sign my ticket. I then went to speak to Josh, who told me that originally when the band had seen me, they had noted that I had arrived really early, and they were wondering “who is that guy?” But then afterwards, they saw me helping out the crowd, and said they definitely had to get me on the special guest list. I asked him if it weren’t pushing it if I could somehow remain in contact with them. “Sure,” he said, and we then exchanged email addresses. I later left the building and got home at around 23h00. For the halfway point of my exchange, it was a memorable day to remember.